Friday, August 29, 2008

This weekend, I'm participating in an ATC "Collage-a-thon". That's where you make collages all weekend and trade as you go along. This is one of the ones I've done so far. Sometimes, they just come together, and other times, it's a lot of glue and a lot of sticky mess and nothing truly worth showing! Here I used one of my favorite stamps, the black floral looking piece is from an ad for a dove soap, a book page, geometric pp and a swirly stamp on the bottom. The image is colored using inks. I really truly hadn't meant it, but when I looked at the finished piece, it looked like a face to me. I'll post more as I go along.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

I love to combine my passion for painting and ATCs. I look at everything and wonder how I can make an ATC out of this. This is a painting I did last night on a black background of daisies and bleeding hearts. The style again is tole. I really like this style because it's more playful than its more realistic counterpart. There are a multitude of dots all around the border of this card. I might have gotten carried away with them, but I think it adds a softness to card and keeps your eye from wandering too far off into the darkness. I'm trading this one out, but I think I'll make another for my own collection.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

I painted these ATCs freehand using acrylics. This style has many names; "tole", "folkart", "telemark", and even "rosemauling". It all means the same. It is an old traditional style of painting done on furniture, decorative items and china in the scandanavian countries. I started painting this about a year ago, and really love it. To me, the colors really pop on the black background.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

This is another ATC where the background is done using melted crayons. It totally looked like mud when I finished and didn't know if I should save or toss out the background card and start all over again! I'm glad I didn't. I added some distressed images and some computer generated words and, well, here's the finished piece. I really like how it turned out.

Last night I was making backgrounds trying a new technique, melted crayons, that I learned from a friend "seekingforart". I made a lot, and I mean a lot, of mud before I got some cards that I really liked. The background on this is done using two different crayon colors. The images are wallpaper and rub-ons. I then added some white dots using a white gel pen. For those that have never tried this method, it's a lot of fun and uses up crayons that the kids never seem to use! Here's a link: http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/ee/index.php/resources/tutorials/melted_crayon_background/

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

This is probably one of my favorite ATCs. The background's done in ranger inks dabbed with a sponge. The ink splotches are made with a re-inker. Then the image stamped and the words added. I added a clear rhinestone in the eye. The card looked fairly bare even though there were a lot of ink colors. So, I added black, orange and then finally white dots to finish off the card. I really like the way this turned out.

I love paper piecing. The flower is done with ads in magazines from, what else, persian rugs! First I colored the background card with a bit of watercolor. Stamped the leaves on. Then I cut petal shapes at random from the rugs. The stem and leaves are also done from green rugs. The dragonflies are done from another set of basic looking rugs.

The kids are back in school today. I should be happy that I've got tons of me time again, but I'm really so sad. I never could handle the first day of school well. The kids are excited, but now I'm so lonely. The house is quite, and there no pitter patter of little and big feet. No legos on the floors, no little mattel cars to walk over. No music blaring from my teenager's room. Man, I can hear myself rattling around this house. No one to make breakfast for. I always feel like crying and actually do cry on the first day of school. I know that's kind of dorky of me, but I know I'll be fine in a couple of days just today is hard. I never can stay in the house, so I booked myself a pedicure and a facial. Hey, that aught to cheer me up!!